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Post by dragonwarrior8 on Jan 2, 2019 21:48:52 GMT
Thrilled as I am that Fighting Fantasy isn't dead, nobody seems especially eager for another of Ian's adventures. More writers attracted to the genre would be better. Although I always loved Ian's style of writing and his encounters, and never really understood how his gamebooks are more linear than most, excluding those which are notably non-linear. Im torn between two trains of thought on this. On the one hand I feel like its his creation so he should be able to do whatever he wants with it. On the other hand it seems like he passed his prime on FF many, many moons ago and should turn the keys over to somebody else.
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Post by Pete Byrdie on Jan 2, 2019 22:35:23 GMT
Thrilled as I am that Fighting Fantasy isn't dead, nobody seems especially eager for another of Ian's adventures. More writers attracted to the genre would be better. Although I always loved Ian's style of writing and his encounters, and never really understood how his gamebooks are more linear than most, excluding those which are notably non-linear. Im torn between two trains of thought on this. On the one hand I feel like its his creation so he should be able to do whatever he wants with it. On the other hand it seems like he passed his prime on FF many, many moons ago and should turn the keys over to somebody else. I think your trains of thought are valid enough. It is his creation and it's up to him what he does with it; it's his right regardless of what fans want. But what he probably should do is let others lead the franchise.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Jan 17, 2019 20:04:11 GMT
Thrilled as I am that Fighting Fantasy isn't dead, nobody seems especially eager for another of Ian's adventures. More writers attracted to the genre would be better. Although I always loved Ian's style of writing and his encounters, and never really understood how his gamebooks are more linear than most, excluding those which are notably non-linear. Im torn between two trains of thought on this. On the one hand I feel like its his creation so he should be able to do whatever he wants with it. On the other hand it seems like he passed his prime on FF many, many moons ago and should turn the keys over to somebody else. Who would be the driving force behind it? Jon Green perhaps? I'm glad the series is not dead and indeed new titles are coming out here and there.
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Post by Wilf on Jan 17, 2019 20:47:35 GMT
Jon Green is the obvious standard-bearer, and an excellent choice IMO.
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Post by dragonwarrior8 on Jan 18, 2019 2:02:07 GMT
Im torn between two trains of thought on this. On the one hand I feel like its his creation so he should be able to do whatever he wants with it. On the other hand it seems like he passed his prime on FF many, many moons ago and should turn the keys over to somebody else. Who would be the driving force behind it? Jon Green perhaps? I'm glad the series is not dead and indeed new titles are coming out here and there. Jon Green was who I had in mind also. Sounds like he has his own thing going now so maybe he wouldn't even be interested but he does have an obvious love of FF so I have to believe it would be tough for him to turn it down if he was given the chance to oversee the whole thing. Would Ian ever turn it over to him anyway do you think? It is kind of disheartening to think that there could be great submissions out there that will never see the light of day while Ian can probably get whatever he writes released just because of his name.
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Jan 25, 2019 23:57:23 GMT
Oooh. Thanks Mudworm. Have you spotted any info on what it's about, or a potential title at all? I'm guessing not, but let us know if you do. You generally spot these things quicker than me, so I often hear about it first on this forum. No info to speak of really – I didn't know he was pressing on with writing one! Others may know more. All I can see is that he's intending to get it out in the third quarter of this (coming) year, he has a working title but it's not been confirmed and the numbers marked red above are illustrations (not instadeaths as some thought – there are probably more of those!). Also his comment in reply to someone mentioning hag's hair and lotus flower: "You'll need more than that for the new book..." suggests it might be item-collection-intensive. So that's something to complain about already . But nothing on the plot/quest of the thing seems to be public. My guess would be that more details will only be trailed in the run-up to Fighting Fantasy Fest 3 with a full announcement at the event itself, but we shall see. A tiny bit more info here... ( Link to Twitter post if not visible) ...mostly that: 1. Ian has had this one playtested. 2. The first playtester only died five times, which seems reasonable. 3. The title includes 'of'. (Ian replied: "Thanks for your help Martin. No telling people about the plot or I will send in the Shape Changer.")
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Post by Pete Byrdie on Jan 27, 2019 19:54:27 GMT
Ian's books are playtested? You learn something new every day.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Jan 27, 2019 21:19:00 GMT
Am jealous of that art collection and recognise quite a few of them. Left to right top to bottom, Crypt of the Sorceror, Temple of Terror, DandD Fiend Folio Gythanki, [don't know], Trial of Champions, White Dwarf 7 Cover by John Blanche, Forest of Doom, [don't know], [don't know, obscured], Caverns of the Snow Witch, probably Island of the Lizard King, [then City of Thieves - utter guess completely obscured], Deathtrap Dungeon, [don't know partly obscured], Port of Peril, Map of Allansia by Leo Hartas.
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Jan 27, 2019 23:58:01 GMT
Ian's books are playtested? You learn something new every day. We can only assume he hit rock bottom with Blood of the Zombies and saw the light at last – although if someone playtested PoP they were happy to run with their own assumptions!
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Post by philsadler on Jan 28, 2019 3:42:03 GMT
How many stamina points do you gain on reference 1?
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Post by Pete Byrdie on Jan 29, 2019 8:14:49 GMT
I wonder what the chap means when he says he only died five times.
'I've playtested your new book, Ian, and it all works perfectly. I only died five times.'
'Did you reach the end?'
'Yes, it was great!'
'Go back and do it again, and don't cheat this time. Playtesting is pointless if you don't use the rules.'
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Jan 29, 2019 13:56:48 GMT
I wonder what the chap means when he says he only died five times. 'I've playtested your new book, Ian, and it all works perfectly. I only died five times.' 'Did you reach the end?' 'Yes, it was great!' 'Go back and do it again, and don't cheat this time. Playtesting is pointless if you don't use the rules.' Well I suppose we could all be misinterpreting it... "I've completed the Blank of Blank, Ian! And I only died five times." "Great! What did you die from?" "Four stress-related heart attacks and a psychotic break when I thought I could fly. My doctor calls me 'The Defibrillator Kid'." "Wait... what?" "Oh in the book? That was 6,978 times."
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Post by Pete Byrdie on Jan 29, 2019 14:35:21 GMT
I wonder what the chap means when he says he only died five times. 'I've playtested your new book, Ian, and it all works perfectly. I only died five times.' 'Did you reach the end?' 'Yes, it was great!' 'Go back and do it again, and don't cheat this time. Playtesting is pointless if you don't use the rules.' Well I suppose we could all be misinterpreting it... "I've completed the Blank of Blank, Ian! And I only died five times." "Great! What did you die from?" "Four stress-related heart attacks and a psychotic break when I thought I could fly. My doctor calls me 'The Defibrillator Kid'." "Wait... what?" "Oh in the book? That was 6,978 times." I can't remember how to do emoticons on this forum but I was genuinely laughing out loud! Of course, there's always the chance Ian's had a change of heart and decided to be kind to FF players. He's perfectly capable of producing a balanced gamebook. He was willing to take chances and experiment with the medium for Blood of the Zombies. Perhaps he's taken a chance and made a gamebook that can be completed without cheating.
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Post by lordomnibok on Jan 29, 2019 19:54:45 GMT
Fans have been rightly vocal about errors. POP had baffling errors but nothing game breaking,a huge step up from BotZ in that regard. It wouldn't have taken much at all to fix POP's rule anomalies. This play testing post gives me hope that we might see further improvement. I would be gravely disappointed if that wasn't the case, but i am a natural optimist, so I'll shine some good vibes for now and hope that it's been well tested.
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aggsol
Wanderer
Bored...
Posts: 93
Favourite Gamebook Series: Lone Wolf
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Post by aggsol on Jan 29, 2019 20:27:06 GMT
do they actually fix the errors in POP in the next print runs or do they stay that way forever? At least an errata would be in order.
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Post by lordomnibok on Jan 29, 2019 22:38:55 GMT
do they actually fix the errors in POP in the next print runs or do they stay that way forever? At least an errata would be in order. A fix would be lovely, for us, for Livingstone, for everyone really, though I suspect it will stay the same. It is a shame, as those minor issues could very easily be rectified. It's a question for Scholastic, but thankfully the errors are only mildly bemusing, not game breaking. Hopefully these little things will all be smoothed out in his next creation.
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Feb 2, 2019 2:03:53 GMT
do they actually fix the errors in POP in the next print runs or do they stay that way forever? At least an errata would be in order. A fix would be lovely, for us, for Livingstone, for everyone really, though I suspect it will stay the same. It is a shame, as those minor issues could very easily be rectified. It's a question for Scholastic, but thankfully the errors are only mildly bemusing, not game breaking. Hopefully these little things will all be smoothed out in his next creation. I don't own any version of CoH, but wasn't there a problem where in the first run of Wizard they removed one error from Puffin and created another, and then the second run kept the new error and reintroduced the old one?
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Post by lordomnibok on Feb 2, 2019 21:45:48 GMT
I hope not, I don't know, but you may be right. I only heard that they fixed the game breaking error. COH was so complex. The main error certainly needed fixing, but any little adjustments should have been done with extreme caution.
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Post by a moderator on Feb 3, 2019 0:34:55 GMT
It's true, alas. The first Wizard run corrected the 'You reach a dead end' error, but lost the rules variation where taking a wound in combat only caused the loss of 1 Stamina. The second Wizard run reinstated the absence of textual clue but stuck with the reversion to standard combat damage.
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Post by lordomnibok on Feb 3, 2019 0:53:01 GMT
Wow. That's unfortunate. As for Scholastic, I've no idea how they are dealing with things like this. I only buy books from them that haven't been released by previous publishers. Shame Wizard made that error, their versions are pretty nice.
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Post by dragonwarrior8 on Feb 14, 2019 17:42:08 GMT
I was curious also so inquired of them the process on submitting Fighting Fantasy manuscripts (as Im sure others here probably have). Received an email back with a link to their submission procedures which briefly gave me some hope. Then I clicked on the provided link to see Scholastic "no longer accepts unsolicited manuscripts". lol. Thanks a pantload.
This really seems like a wasted opportunity no? I would think its very low risk for them to accept outside written books. They could decide if they liked the idea based on the synopsis then all they would need is a handful of people to play-test it for a couple of weeks to make sure its not broken, doesnt violate any guidelines regarding profanity etc and provide their overall assessment as to its quality. Id wager there are people on this site even who would do this for free just for the chance to play new adventures and maybe have their name in the front of the book somewhere.
Im guessing they just dont think there is a big enough market for Fighting Fantasy anymore to make it profitable even if they released a great book?
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Post by lordomnibok on Feb 15, 2019 0:09:34 GMT
I admire your attempt DragonWarrior8. I tried and got the same: "No unsolicited material. Thank you," response. It's a shame, as the way FF used to do it (opening their doors to all the creative minds out there) worked a treat. You suggested a possible reason as to why this is their stance. Maybe you are right. Maybe they just want known authors as they think this will boost sales. If they have synopsis after synopsis in their mail, the material needs to be read and considered. That costs them time and money. Maybe they just don't think it's worth it. But who knows. Its just a different time I guess.
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Post by The Editor (Alex B) on Feb 15, 2019 3:50:19 GMT
Maybe they just want known authors as they think this will boost sales. This is a problem even in the non-gamebook children's fiction world. New authors are being pushed out of consideration by 'celebrity' authors because publisher consider their names guarantee greater interest and thus sales.
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aggsol
Wanderer
Bored...
Posts: 93
Favourite Gamebook Series: Lone Wolf
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Post by aggsol on Feb 15, 2019 10:05:11 GMT
just release it as a selfpublisher. it is easy and fast. you must not use the Fighting Fantasy name but you can find an audience.
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Post by dragonwarrior8 on Feb 15, 2019 16:23:23 GMT
Thanks LordOmnibok. I guess we long for the days when there were 5-6 new books a year as opposed to 1 new book and 5 re-releases. They only way they could manage that many new ones a year I think would be to accept submissions though. Did Jonathan Green not come to prominence this way? Think of what we would have lost! I wonder how many more like him might be out there. Im really confident some kind of cost effective system could be found if there was the will to do so on their side. If they also advertised it as a way for aspiring authors to get their work published I think they might really be on to something.
Its funny you mention that about children's fiction Alex. I noticed in the response I received they mentioned "children's fiction submission". My first thought was...childrens fiction?? What are you talking about? lol. I havent thought of them as children's books for awhile. At least not the later more intricate gamebooks that have been released. (I never considered House of Hell a childrens book either for that matter) I have to believe there are more adults playing gamebooks now than children and figured thats who they were aimed at. I dont have any statistics to back that up however so maybe that isnt the case.
As far as self-publishing goes, Im sure someone here will correct me if Im wrong but I believe youd have to come up with your own game system because Im almost certain the Fighting Fantasy system is copyrighted.
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Post by lordomnibok on Feb 15, 2019 17:46:47 GMT
Rightly so, a non FF gamebook should have different fighting rules. I think its okay to be similar, but they should have some unique aspects. Other publishers were interested in my own work some years ago, but they wanted all dice aspects removed. They also wanted to dilute the darker tone of my work, so my thoughts started moving towards self publishing, which has its own challenges for sure. I'll self publish later this month and let you know how it goes.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Feb 17, 2019 17:44:20 GMT
Though I would say that they were aimed at children, the books did not ‘talk down’ to them or patronise them.
Dragonwarrior said: I have to believe there are more adults playing gamebooks now than children and figured that’s who they were aimed at. I dont have any statistics to back that up however so maybe that isnt the case.
I’m inclined to agree with you. How we’d go about finding out the truth of it, I do not know. No idea what the sales figures are either, or if the new titles are outselling the reprints. Jon Green sells his books at conventions as well as over the internet, right? So he'd have an idea of who is buying them at conventions like the UK Games Expo..
Who is buying and playing the re-released Way of the Tiger, Bloodsword and Fabled Lands? Or the ‘Steam Highwayman’ book by Martin Noutch for example? My money is on adults....
Why do publishers consider gamebooks to be children’s fiction? Is it out of inertia or ‘tradition’ or their marketing strategy based on research? Are they right to put them in the aged 9-12's (or wherever they are)? Shouldn't some of the books be in the science fiction/fantasy section?
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Post by dragonwarrior8 on Feb 19, 2019 21:50:30 GMT
Excellent points bloodbeasthandler and has got me thinking over the past couple of days. While I realize that Puffin was a children's publisher Im wondering if that's who the series was ever intended for. If Steve and Ian wrote Warlock of Firetop as an intro to Dungeons & Dragons I would think it was meant for an older age group even then. I knew quite a few D&D players growing up and they were all in their mid teens to early 20s. Perhaps some of you knew some younger players though. The fact that many (myself included) fell in love with the FF series when we were in that 6-12 age range might have been more "happy accident" than anything which helped push its early success over the top. Id be interested if Steve or Ian ever said in an interview what the target age range for the series actually was.
It also feels like all gamebooks got unfairly grouped in with the Choose Your Own Adventure series (which I think youd agree really was intended for children) and havent been able to break out of it since. Choose Your Own Adventure, Be An Interplanetary Spy, Time Machine...those seem like children's series to me. Fighting Fantasy and Lone Wolf? Not so much, even from the beginning.
I agree with you about who is playing those other series and would bet serious money that they are being played mostly by adults. Id love to see FF go the way of Bloodsword, Fabled Lands and Way of the Tiger and make all their books available from Amazon as print-on-demand accompanied by some sort of marketing campaign. Amazon is crushing everyone sales wise these days and is where a great majority of people will go to browse/shop for books. True, some of the earlier books in the range could probably be found cheaper second hand but the authors make no money off those. So perhaps they could offer some kind of promotion whereby if you order all books 1-59 through Amazon youd receive a 12" statue of Zanbar Bone or something else nice as an example.
I also realize (as other members such as Alex have pointed out) that there are copyright issues with authors who arent Steve or Ian. However if a concerted heartfelt effort was made, offering all authors the same royalty % for their respective books, and providing them a chance to hopefully get new people to read their work, Id like to think that they could get everyone on board. Maybe thats just me being overly optimistic though.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Feb 24, 2019 20:22:47 GMT
Yeah, it's got me thinking too. Do you have 'You are the Hero'? Have a look at pages 14 and 15 - WOFTM went to Puffin after the powers-that-were at Penguin rejected it. Also note that the Sorcery! series was initially marketed as for adults.
As you say I got the impression that D&D was in practice mid/late teens to university-aged people. Look at the gamebook-writing generation who got into it when it first came out - they were almost all born in the 1950's - so aged late teens or twenty-odd when D&D first came out. Also note the sort of roleplaying articles and discussions in White Dwarf in the late 70's and a lot of the 80's - again not aimed at pre-teens in my opinion at all.
FF books were a happy accident indeed and a gateway for many people to all sorts of table-top gaming activities which persist to this day, including roleplaying.
As for reprinting 1-59 I have to say I have little interest in reprints, from a purely selfish point of view. I already have 1-59 and would rather see effort put into bringing out new titles, whether written by the old hands or not.
What do we think Ian's new book is going to be? A pure guess … Deathtrap Dungeon 3 maybe?
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Post by daredevil123 on Feb 24, 2019 20:46:35 GMT
What do we think Ian's new book is going to be? A pure guess … Deathtrap Dungeon 3 maybe? I wouldn't be surprised if Ian's new book is a sequel. The ending of The Port of Peril seemed to tease a return to Deathtrap Dungeon as well so you could be right.
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